the world's longest blog post

so, here's a bunch of stuff because i know you're absolutely DYING to know.

i got a new car and it is unlike anything you've ever seen in seattle.
it looks like this:

i got a new tattoo and it looks like this: (the picture doesn't do it justice. it looks really great) here's a closer-up of the airplane:
and the story behind it is this:
my grandfather elmer was in the air force in world war 2. and he was a real hero. not the erin brockovich type of hero, but the protect-your-freedom-in-a-war type. he flew in a b24 liberator. the old grey wolf. he flew in a million missions over europe. a lot of people flew in one mission or a half of a mission and they were killed. my grandfather was not killed. he survived the entire time to return home to his wife charlotte. they both died recently. i miss them very much.
they had a painting in their house that looked like this:
it's a b24 bombing italian oil refineries. i am awfully fond of it because it reminds me of my grandparents. jamie at liberty tattoo married the two images and put them on my body. with a needle and some ink. it hurt tremendously. but not nearly as much as it hurt to lose my grandparents. elmer would love my tattoo. well, probably not because old people don't really like tattoos. but he would appreciate it.

i don't really race bicycles anymore. i totally lost motivation to do it this year. it rained a lot. and i made a bunch of excuses. at some point after december i fell out of shape. then i stopped riding regularly. then i stopped having fun when i did ride because i felt like doodoo butter each time i went out. i've done two races this year. in one i finished 79th. in the other i crashed in the miserable rain. on neither occasion did i have fun. cycling should be fun. people should do stuff that's fun in their spare time. not stuff that makes them miserable. right? i mean it's good to push yourself and step outside of your comfort zone for a bit, but it's got to result in some sort of positive outcome. if i'm wrong here, just let me know and i'll punch myself in the nuts repeatedly. i may get back into bike racing. but probably not this year. due in large part to the climbing trip that i'm taking in july/august.
i'm going here:
it's called ceuse and it's in france.
up closer it looks like this in spots:

riding a bike right now will not make the climbing there any easier. nor will it make me more french. riding a bike in a bike race might even make me more injured. to get ready for the trip i have been climbing more, eating baguettes, wearing a beret, smoking cigarettes, and just being a dick.
i'm going there with my friend zach. i went on a climbing trip with zach a couple years ago. we went to spain. except he wasn't there when i got there because he had already left. hopefully he'll still be in france when i get there. since my spain trip didn't quite turn out the way i had planned. i still like zach even though he left spain before i got there. that's why i'm going to france to meet him. zach, please still be in france.

on another note, i have a great girlfriend:
her name is therese. she is a nurse practitioner and is gonna be a midwife. someday she will tell me stories about the painful baby delivery she helped with as opposed to stories about the abscess she removed from some woman's anus. or the fungus she had to remove from some guy's balls. i think nurse practitioning is a very glamorous profession. therese, when you are a midwife please wash the placenta off your hands before touching my face.
therese has a daughter named rose. she's 8 and currently has no front teeth, but she DOES have a sweet mustache:
i like spending time with therese and rose, but don't tell them that because it'll go to their heads and they'll get all cocky and shit.

at the end of july i will have worked at the vertical world climbing gym for 8 years. that is a LONG summer job.

my brother's baby charlotte is amazing.
she's almost four months old. soon she will have a job and husband. or a robot since she will be growing up in the future.

if you've made it this far, thanks for your patience. you'll now be rewarded with millions of dollars. and by millions of dollars, i mean some comedy:

when life gives you lemons, life better hope you asked for lemons or life's gonna get his ass kicked.

how does the saying go? april showers bring may flowers? or is it november, december, january, february, march, AND april showers bring more showers. and obesity. and depression.

i heard that march was the wettest in the history of the world in seattle. it's funny, i didn't even notice. it stays dry under my bed covers and it's hard to see rain through my tears. and fat.
i'm pretty much that typical seattleite complaining about rain all winter and then complaining about the heat in the summer.
it is just not possible to win. life is SO hard.

thank god for talking babies!


and thank god for friday!


it's friday friday. gettin down on friday...
yesterday was thursday. today it is friday. we we we so excited. we so excited. we gonna have a ball today. tomorrow is saturday. and sunday comes afterwards. i don't want this weekend to end.

and also thank god for words with friends.

chicago! or "how i was almost killed by a mexican"

so, i recently took a trip to chicago to visit my niece.

and my brother's dog otis.

oh, and then these people named jason and jessie insisted on hanging around.

jk! just kidding! they are my brother and brother's baby momma. also they're engaged to be wed, so all you religious types out there don't trip out.
anyway. it was a pretty great trip. i mean if you know me, and i assume you do because you're reading this blog, then you know how much i LOVE babies. the only thing i love more than babies is k$sha. and the movie 8mm.
the greatest thing about babies is that they crap on themselves and DON'T EVEN CARE! could you imagine having enough self confidence to just shit in your pants and not worry what anyone else thinks? my goodness! and the last time i threw up on someone i was super embarrassed. a baby will throw up on you and instead of apologizing will DO IT AGAIN. as if to say, "oh perhaps you'd like some more of my puke on you. in case you didn't get enough the first time!" they don't even care what shirt you're wearing! babies, i salute you. sometimes i'll cry, but i'm always sure to lock myself in my dark bedroom and turn the music up real loud so no one can hear my sobs. babies? they'll wail and wail and wail and then generally instead of looking around uncomfortably as everyone stares, they'll just fall asleep. they're so relaxed!
babies, confident and relaxed. and they're like rich people, aren't they? they have servants! and they don't even have to pay them. could you imagine if you had someone to bring you food all the time and even put it in your mouth for you?! and people to change your clothes. and hold you and rock you. damn, wouldn't that be something? you'd be just like carlton on the fresh prince of bel air.
or one of those rich oil guys.
well, besides the baby, i did some serious budweiser drinking. and food eating. and sleeping. i was pretty much a lazy gluttonous bastard. perfect. that's what vacations are for, right?


in other news, a mexican almost beat me up for flipping him off in traffic. lesson learned. don't flip mexicans off because there's a good chance that it wasn't even them honking at you in the first place. lo siento, mi amigo. lo siento.

I AM NOT A NERD!

but i love battlestar galactica!



come on people! it's not like i'm watching star trek or something.
totally different.

warpaint

psyched to see the guys (ladies) march 20th at the neumos.

books!

before the combination of television and the internet, i considered myself a reader. but thanks to hulu and streaming netflix, i'm now a watcher...
sometimes i miss reading. if only they still made books...
here is an extensive list of books i've read.
not just to make me look smart, but also to provide you with some recommendations. you know, just in case you have a kindle or something.

prep sittenfeld - i've never felt more like a 16 year old girl than when i read this.
catcher in the rye salinger (also franny and zooey)
city of theives benioff
books by murakami wind-up bird chronicle, kafka on the shore, a wild sheep chase
books by eggers a heartbreaking work of staggering genius, you shall know our velocity, what is the what - he might be pretty arrogant, but he writes a mean book. his description of a kidney stone in a heartbreaking work is pretty spot on.
the bus driver who wanted to be god keret - great short stories
visiting hours wunderlee - if nothing else, this guy is handsome.
books by shtyengart the russian debutante's handbook and absurditan - hilarious. who knew russians could be so funny? because there's nothing funny about perestroika.
history of love krauss - if you want to have your heart broken, read this.
books by jonathan safran foer everything is illuminated, extremely loud and incredibly close, eating animals
drop city boyle - hippies move to alaska!
DO NOT READ WATER FOR ELEPHANTS OR A MILLION LITTLE PIECES
books by ian mcewan saturday, atonement, amsterdam
never let me go ishiguro
disgrace coetzee - whoa, heavy.
books by zadie smith white teeth, the autograph man, on beauty
the curious incident of the dog in the night time haddon - nice one from an autistic kid's perspective.
life of pi martel
persepolis satrapi - or just watch the movie. it's a cartoon!
snow pamuk
rabbit, run updike
the bell jar plath - i'm not even finished with this one yet, but it's blog worthy.
cat's cradle vonnegut
the sea banville - if you do read water for elephants, read a book like this after to restore your faith in the literary world. mike tyson could write a best seller.
the road mccarthy
on the road kerouac - he's clearly on a different road than cormac mccarthy's road.
in cold blood capote - a book by philip seymour hoffman.
fear and loathing in las vegas thompson - that's a lot of drugs.
the great gatsby fitzgerald
the known world jones
the amazing adventures of kavalier and clay chabon (and mysteries of pittsburgh)
middlesex eugenides - just skip the first hundred or so pages like i did.
motherless brooklyn lethem
interpreter of maladies lahiri
the secret history tartt

still more baby

not to be outdone (and maybe crying out for some lost attention), my brother's dog OTIS had an armless, torsoless baby of his own:


is it just me, or there a resemblance here:

more baby!

since i don't have much going on, i will probably just post pics of charlotte everyday from here on out...
you're welcome.



(a team of surgeons removed her arms, legs, and torso and left just the head...)

uncle follow up

just to revisit an old post...
and since i'm sure you're all dying of impatience to know...
as of 8:15 am PST today, i'm an uncle!
so psyched.
charlotte kathryn.
7 lbs 5 ozs.
born without hands. but beautiful besides...

my grammy recap

it turns out the grammys is not a tv show dedicated to grandparents.
it has to do with MUSIC. and according to grammy dot com, it's "music's biggest night." so since i am a well respected music critic, i will recap this awards program for you here:

lady antebellum won song of the year and record of the year.

well deserved. well deserved. lady antebellum has released a great song and album. musically and lyrically it cannot be topped. my only question is:
who the fuck is lady antebellum?! and how did they win a music award?!
that's two questions. but seriously.
lady antebellum beat cee lo green for this award. cee lo green responded to losing by issuing this statement:
"fuck you. and fuck you too."

katy perry was nominated for an award or seven. she's got real talent. and she loves showing them off. and by "them," i mean her boobs.

the best pop vocal album came down to these artists: lady gaga, katy perry, john mayer, justin bieber, and susan boyle?! one of these nominees is not like the others... this one:

best hard rock performance took us back to the 90s: nominees included alice in chains, soundgarden, stone temple pilots, and ozzy osbourne. I'm pretty sure all these lead singers died of heroin overdoses. especially ozzy osbourne. he's the most dead of them all.

but seriously folks, ozzy still looks great for being 97 years old. and dead.
them crooked vultures ultimately took home the award. which is fine. because i do love them crooked vultures.
i'm also not afraid to say that i'm a fan of eminem. and he won an award or two as well. but what happened to his face?!


OMG, el debarge was nominated for a grammy too!

arcade fire won album of the year with the suburbs. and THIS is a great album. but what's the difference between album of the year and record of the year?

if i learned anything from this year's grammy awards it's that i don't know who the hell any of these people are (bruno mars? esperanza spalding? sara bareilles? robert plant?). and also that music makes me angry.

this, on the other hand, does NOT make me angry:


(oh, and i DO know who robert plant is. i was jk'ing. just kidding ing)

thanks

it was only a matter of time, but my readership has gone global.
i'm basically facebook. minus the poking and the billions of dollars.
but really, pretty much the same.

well, i wanted to take this opportunity to recognize you, the readers, and give thanks (and also to give over-punctuated sentences).

so, thank you.
and "ta" to the australians.
"danke" to my austrian readers.
(contrary to popular belief, austria and australia are not the same)
"merci" to the french.
"gracias, amigos" to the south (LA and mexico)
if you live in malaysia, i hope you speak english and understand "thank you." or maybe if i said it louder, you'd understand... THANK YOU. because as we know, SPEAKING LOUDER TO SOMEONE THAT DOESN'T SPEAK ENGLISH MAKES THEM UNDERSTAND.
(sunbears live in malaysia)
"thanks, guv'nah" to those of you in the UK.
and "maraming salamat" to my friends in the philippines. who is this, by the way?

if you weren't thanked here, you're not reading. you know who you are, spain. china. kazakhstan.

and now a moment of beauty and inspiration:

meaty meat palace

when i lived in LA i would often drive by this place:

i never stopped there, but i always wondered what kind of establishment it was. i think maybe it was a cobbler. or a graphic design firm.
in a totally unrelated topic (one very close to my heart - literally and figuratively): the eating of MEAT.
i don't do it. and i don't suggest that you do it.
but if you INSIST on doing it, you should do it at my friend cormac's new restaurant: the meaty meat palace. aka MADISON PARK CONSERVATORY.
it's in madison park. all the way down by the water. there used to be a different restaurant there, but that restaurant sucked. like any other restaurant in comparison. the conservatory is really cool. as is the staff. and the food is... to die for. well, the food died for you. like jesus did for us. the food here is like jesus. you can get vegan dishes like foie gras, beef tongue, quail, elk shank, pig fat roasted potatoes, vegetables in meat sauce, meat with meat sauce, meaty meat meat slices wrapped in meat and served with meat sauce... okay, maybe the last few of those aren't on the menu, but the fancy stuff is. and they DO have a couple vegetarian items: there's an emmer dish (i got without cheese) that's fantastic. and there's some salads (i think the croutons in the caesar salad are cooked in anchovy oil) and a lentil and carrot dish. and kale! and if all that doesn't sound delicious, well, you're an idiot.
so, go there. and get fed. and feel full and happy. and then feel bad that all those animals died for your sins.
oh, they also have booze. and who doesn't like booze?
(and if you're lucky, tilson will join you for dinner)

happy new year.

2010 sucked for a lot of reasons and was pretty sweet for a lot of reasons.
let's hope that in 2011 sweet > suck.

i've resolved to stop smoking. walk 30 minutes three times a week to TAME THAT BULGE. volunteer to help others. use the word "quixotic" more. eat macadamia nuts. blink less. wear an ascot. look to the left when i'm lost in thought as opposed to right. drink more beer and LESS water. make my own blog. drive from here to there. think about sex at least once a day. open doors with my left hand. speak only when spoken to. kill a terrorist. clone a goat. learn to read. shake weight. when writing use "your" instead of "you're." and i want to look like this:

and most importantly: work like i don't need money, love like i've never been hurt, and dance like no one is watching.